Abu Simbel Temple Egypt, Pictures

Click on link for Abu Simbel Temple Pictures, Egypt

The day started with a 3:30am wakeup call followed by a 3:41am call to cancel the 4am convoy to Abu Simbel due to bad weather (a sand storm). We were to go back to bed and make sure we ate by 10am, meet at 10:30am to take the 11am convoy. We were part of 50 – 70 busses and vans traveling 3 hours through the dessert with police escort at the beginning, middle and end of the convoy. It was for protection incase of breakdown or thieves as there is nothing between Aswan and Abu Simbel, Egypt. There was the odd check point but no houses, service stations or people, just sand. Abu Simbel is 50 kms from the Sudan boarder.

Abu Simbel is two temples in the dessert. They were built in 1300 BC. The king made one for himself and another for his wife or wives. I think it was for his one special wife, but not sure. He had 85 wives and 155 children. The temples were very cool with amazing carvings and details. Each detail is of significance. The way the arms are crossed, royalty and it was made when they were dead. The stance, what's in their hands the headpieces every little thing has some special meaning.

Again this was another project that was moved from one area to another from 1964 – 1968 it was dismantled and moved at a cost of $40 million. It was moved because of this damn and the Nasser Lake. I don't know why they just didn't divert the water again, who knows.

We have been having excellent Egyptian food. I wouldn't normally choose where we eat or the food, but it has been fantastic. It is great to have the guide. For example the other day we entered one restaurant and at the entrance was raw meat strung all over the place and I am sure I heard a saw cutting bones while we were eating. But it is great food. We had a mixed barbeque of meats that day.

Off for a day on the Felucca, a wind powered boat that we will cruise 45km down the Nile in and sleep on tonight.

Pyramids, Egypt, Photos

Click on the following link for the Pyramid pictures.

Link for Pyramid Photos

I had an Easter Monday to remember. I spent the day exploring the Pyramids. They were spectacular. I loved climbing around the Giza site. There were three at that location that are approximately 5000 years old! I also had a camel ride around the Pyramids.

I am traveling with a small group of six people around Egypt for the next couple of weeks. It is terrific, we have a guide and it has made life easy and hassle free.

After the Pyramids and camel ride we visited the Egyptian Museum. Man the history here. I am sorry but I knew nothing about Egyptian history before coming and it has humbled me. I am amazed at how old everything is. I will have to do some reading.

At the museum I went into the mummy exhibit. It was so neat. The mummies were from 2100 and 1000 B.C. (before Christ!). It was shocking for me. The mummies were in great shape with hair, skin, fingernails and the intricate wrappings on some of them.

I ate pigeon today. It had a lot of bones, not a lot of meat.

We took a sleeper train last night it was first class and way above my expectations. I am now in Ashwan Egypt at the south and going even further south tomorrow, within 50kms of the Sudan boarder.

Today we visited a Greek Roman Temple (Philae Temple). Again the history, it was from 230 B.C. and was moved from one island to another from 1970 – 1980 after being submerged in the Nile River. Each wall or pillar tells a different myth or story. The legends and stories are overwhelming. My brain is on overload. I also visited the Unfinished Oblisk today. It is a large phallic sculpture made of granite that cracked while being constructed. All of the granite for the temples comes from the area of Ashwan and is transported throughout all the Egypt. This all started thousands of years ago, before Christ.

I am having a spectacular time in Egypt, hope you are all well.

P.S. It was 46 degrees Celsius today in Ashwan!

Munich Germany, Pictures

Click on the following link to see the Munich pictures.
Munich Photos
I have spent the last few days in Munich. It is a great city. I went to the BMW museum it was fabulous. Did you know they make a clay model of each vehicle or proto type? I learned they employ a ton of different artists above the typical engineers etc. In Munich alone BWM employs approximateley 35 000.

The BWM area was dominating. The buildings were works of art. They are big on creativity and solar energy. The BWM headquarters building is in the shape of four cylinders. Frank and all other auto teachers will have to take a class trip to Munich.

I went on a walking tour of the city, saw tons of churches, climbed one of the steeples for a panoramic view of Munich. Took part in the Good Friday procession while on the tour!

I went to Dacau Concentration Camp, wow! It was a beautiful warm day, but I couldn´t help but feel cold and chilled in the cells and gas chamber. Dacau was a concentration camp, not a death camp. The people were sent there to work. The sign on the gate indicates that work liberates. They were under the false pretences that if they worked hard they may be freed. Dacau is a place of learning and remembering. It was amazing to see a map indicating the number of concentration camps, subcamps etc. that existed. There was one memorial that said we must honor the dead and worn the living. It was about making people aware of what humans are capable of doing to each other. I cann´t do it justice, it was a powerful place.

BMW Z4, Germany, Pictures

Well last night was an interesting night. I had emailed Olaf my friend that I met in Africa. He and I were truck buddies. We sat together for a month through Africa, poor guy. Anyway small world he lives within one kilometer of Erin. So we met up last evening. Erin was not feeling well so didn’t join us. When I met him it was funny, he said “have you ordered a drink?” I said “no.” He said “great lets go somewhere else.” So instead of walking he brought his new BMW Z4 convertible to take me for a rip. Remember I told you lots of nice sports cars in Frankfurt. So there we were. I got a tour of the historic sites of Frankfurt in the BWM with the roof down and then we had to take her for a rip on the autobahn (highway). Remember, no speed limit, you are only limited by the vehicle in front of you so we had it up to 200 km/h. It was great, we spent so much time together in Africa he knew I love cars and had to bring it and take me for a ride.

After our tour we met up with Carmel his girlfriend who is from Ireland and did dinner at a German pub. We sampled the famous apple wine (cider) and then visited a wine cellar that was literally an underground pub complete with a free musty smell. They have interesting versions of beer here to try. I have had the cola beer, banana beer and my favorite the grapefruit beer.

Check out the pictures at the following link.

More Germany Photos

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahemoloney/MoreGermany#

Germany, Pictures

Germany has been great I have to say a very big THANK YOU to Erin for letting me come. I came last minute on her when the malaria medication was playing havoc with me in India, thanks again Erin.

Erin has two great apartments here in Germany, one in Frankfurt, where she works at the Dow Jones as a Financial Journalist and another in Heidelberg with her boyfriend Thomas. They are both great. Frankfurt is a big city with lots of money and sports cars and Heidelberg is a very quant and calming area in the hills with lots of nice homes, gardens, lovely trees and flowers blooming.

I mention the sports cars because as I just learned Germany does not have a speed limit. I am not sure why more Canadian men do not visit Germany. You can rent a Porsche or a Ferrari and let her rip. Even I was feeling the need for speed and thought man, I would get one of those babies and red line her. My bothers would be happy that I can tell them I saw a new Corvette today. So if you want to see some nice wheels and you’re interested in seeing how fast they will go, visit Germany.

There were a lot of police around the other day when we were in Karlsruhe as Obama was in Baden-Baden which is not far from there. We must have seen a pack of 20 motorcycle cops followed by four police crusers.

The weather has been lovely here. No rain, nice sunny days with a high around 20 degrees Celsius.

Click on the following link for some pictures.

Germany Pictures

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahemoloney/Germany#

Mumbai India, Pictures

Click on the following link to see the pictures. I suggest viewing the slide show as lots of the pictures have extra info on them.
>Mumbai Pictures

http://picasaweb.google.com/sarahemoloney/MumbaiIndia#

Well India was a little shorter than I planned on, but these things happen. I had to leave do to health reasons. I was ill right from the beginning not eating or drinking and was very afraid of getting dehydrated and needing an IV, but couldn’t get anything into my system. I believe the big issue was my malaria medication. The sickness and feelings are all side effects of the medication, but the big one was hallucinations and anxiety. I couldn’t sleep at night and my mind was going crazy. In my mind it seems like I was there for a long time. I was not right, some would say I was never right, but then this, oh my god, I was tripping out. I thought Dennis and Carol were there on my shoulder on more than one occasion. Sorry guys no offence but I was not myself.

The malaria medication is very potent and needs to be taken with a full meal and you should be having three full meals a day on it. I would take it when I ate but there wouldn’t be enough in my system to counter balance the side effects, hence my mind was going crazy. I stopped taking the medication and was starting to feel better the day I left, but was worried about being there and not taking the medication. One of those you’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you don’t situations. I will have to keep India on the list and return when I am healthy and my system can take the medication.

I did manage to get some site seeing in in Mumbai with Matt and Toula from Melbourne. They were lovely to me. We went with a driver and an employee from the hotel, Nareer on a tour of Mumbai. It was great we got to see a lot of non-tourist spots. We visited at least half a dozen different types of temples, The Gateway of India, Taj Hotel where there were bombings not that long ago. There is no evidence left of any such thing occurring there. We also went to a building were Gandhi lived when he was in India, it is now a museum. We went to the Dhavari Slum, the slum from Slum Dog Millionaire; tourists don’t get to see that. We were welcomed with open arms there; the people kept following us through the lanes. We had quite the entourage. We found out later that some of them thought we were scouting for Slum Dog 2 and kept wanting us to take their pictures. We also got to go to Nareer’s home and had lunch with his family that was awesome. They live in a building on the second floor and have two approx. 8’ x 10’ rooms across a common hall. There is a concrete floor, no furniture, some pots for cooking and a baby basket hanging from the ceiling. Ten people live in this space, three children and seven adults. There was a narrow ladder to climb to a second level where they slept on the floor. It was so cool to get to see their space and eat lunch with them. They were so happy to have us. Nareer has a son 5 and a daughter 12. She was very confident and took us around their neighbourhood. She was proud to show me her math book. She is in year 7 and their high school goes until year 10. In year seven math or at age 12 she was factoring and working with quadratics, for all you mathies following the blog. We toured around the city on a Sunday which was a blessing as most things are shut on Sundays and the traffic wasn’t too bad. It is usually insane.

Myrtle Beach

Last week I had the opportunity to go to Myrtle Beach. It was a fun time filled with family, friends, golfing, hot tubs and Margarita Ville. There were many people there from Peterborough and in our group we were 25 people between a couple of hotels.

Tomorrow night I will be flying to India and starting the next part of the journey.